Maharashtra to grow at lower rate: Economic survey

Representation pic

Ahead of the annual budget presentation on Thursday, the Economic Survey projected Maharashtra's economy to grow by 6.8 per cent, as against last year's projection of 12.1 per cent. The agriculture and allied activities sector is expected to grow by 10.2 per cent, against 4.4 per cent projected in 2021-22.

The state growth rate is almost similar to the nation's projected rate - 7 per cent, that was said to be taking the country on a path of recovery post the COVID-19 pandemic. The state economy too was hit by the pandemic in the past two years.

Agriculture offers a mixed picture as the production of cereals, oil seeds, cotton, and sugarcane is expected to increase by 10 per cent, 19 per cent, 5 per cent and four per cent, respectively, while the production of pulses is likely to decrease by 37 per cent over the previous year. The impact of the unseasonal rains that hit the standing crop in the past three-four days could be assessed later and get reflected in the corrected estimates.

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Maharashtra's industry sector is expected to grow by 6.1 per cent and services sector is expected to grow by 6.4 per cent. As per advance estimates, nominal (at current prices) Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) for 2022-23 is expected to be Rs 35,27,084 crore and real (at constant 2011-12 prices) GSDP is expected to be Rs 21,65,558 crore.

The average share of the state in all-India nominal GDP is highest (14.0 per cent). The per capita state income for 2022-23 is expected at Rs 2,42,247 as against Rs 2,15,233 for 2021-22. The percentage of fiscal deficit to GSDP is 2.5 per cent and debt stock to GSDP is 18.4 per cent.

The revenue receipts of the state are expected to be Rs 4,03,427 crore for 2022-23 (BE) as against Rs 3,62,133 crore during 2021-22. The tax and non-tax revenue (including central grants) for 2022-23 are Rs 3,08,113 crore and Rs 95,314 crore respectively. Actual revenue receipts from April to November, 2022 were Rs 2,51,924 crore (62.4 per cent of estimates).

The state is expected to spend Rs 4,27,780 crore this year as against last year's Rs 3,92,857 crore. On the investment front, the state has received Rs 10,88,502 crore in foreign direct investment (FDI) from April 2022 to September 2022, which was 28.5 per cent of total FDI inflows in the country.

It will be interesting to see how deputy CM and in-charge of the finance department, Devendra Fadnavis, bases his first-ever budget, which is also the maiden for his alliance government that faces the election year. Whatever is needed to be done to attract voters could be accomplished in Thursday's full budget.